


Legend

by Piandaoist (piandaoist)



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Blood and Violence, Brutal Murder, Gen, Gore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:13:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 382
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24501388
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/piandaoist/pseuds/Piandaoist
Summary: He's the stuff of children's nightmares.  He's Piandao the Butcher! #atla15 prompt | Legend
Comments: 4
Kudos: 9
Collections: #atla15 -- Avatar the Last Airbender 15th Anniversary Prompt Challenge, Piandaoist's Short Stories Collection, The Piandao Library





	Legend

**Author's Note:**

> [Prompt Challenge](https://atlafans.tumblr.com/post/190938611989/caelum-in-the-avatarverse-february-21-2020): [#atla15](https://www.tumblr.com/search/atla15) | Legend [@atlafans](https://tmblr.co/mnuJxs3q96ZkLxemOzj5bqQ)

At the age of twenty, Piandao isn’t a brilliant strategist - he’s a dogged one. He keeps things simple and he sticks with what works. He doesn’t try to be clever. Too much work.

He comes at his enemies with brute force and the deadly speed of a cheetah-viper. Oh, sure, lots of folks have heard of Piandao the Butcher and his savage acts of unspeakable brutality. ...of how he’s cutting a swath of destruction across the Earth Kingdom. But no one is ever really prepared for the terror that overtakes them when they see their friends slain, mutilated and dismembered, stabbed to bloody pulps in front of them, their heads on pikes. No one is truly ready for the sight of a man punching someone so hard, their skull shatters. Mother and Father never prepared anyone for the day when they’d meet a guy who can kick them so hard their testicles explode. The whistle on the wind could be nothing, or it could be the last sound you hear before the Master’s blade takes your head off.

The Butcher brings new meaning to the term “Heads will roll!” The piles of bodies grow higher and more grotesque with each attack. And he keeps coming for them until they’re all dead. If you attack, you’re dead. If you run, you’re dead. If you beg, you’re dead. If you bribe, he takes your loot, and then you’re dead. He will make no exceptions. For him to survive, his enemies must die. This is what he learned at the orphanage where gangs of children fought, sometimes to their bloody deaths, for rations while the orphan master took bets on who would win.

Despite his aversion toward mass murder, at every engagement, he leaves a few civilians alive who will tell the world of his terrible deeds. After all, bad publicity is better than no publicity.

With his newly cultivated legend comes added value to his finely crafted swords, higher rank, and the hope that maybe, someday, his legend will be enough to stop his enemies before they become his enemies. Then there will be no more need for killing. But, for now, he’s a cog in the wheel of a beastly war machine who is just trying to get out of this nightmare alive.


End file.
